


I’m Not In Love With My Absence

by love_killed_the_superstar



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Corrupted Steven Universe, Corruption, Corruption aftermath, Fic Exchange, Gen, Gift Fic, Hopeful Ending, Mental Health Issues, Recovery, Steven Universe Future, post-corruption
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:00:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22192933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/love_killed_the_superstar/pseuds/love_killed_the_superstar
Summary: Steven wakes up and he’s lying in the bathtub. He looks over and sees his father, hunched over, forehead against the lip of the tub while his shoulders rise and fall - deep breath in, and hold, and a loud snore-exhale-whump - with the motions of sleep. Not everything makes sense to begin with. There’s some new scratches on the bathroom ceiling, for instance, deep incisions like a bear’s claws. The shower curtain is on the floor. There’s some blood on the bathmat, but only specks - and by the mop leaning up against the door, he guesses that Pearl was frantically scrubbing at the floor all night, to keep it tidy for him the next day.It’s a small gesture, but significant. He can smell bleach.
Relationships: Steven Universe & Everyone
Comments: 36
Kudos: 395
Collections: The Cluster's Secret Santa Fic Exchange 2019





	I’m Not In Love With My Absence

**Author's Note:**

  * For [citrusella](https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrusella/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Change](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20981957) by [citrusella](https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrusella/pseuds/citrusella). 



> ITS CORRUPTED STEVEN TIME BABEY!!! Hi Citrusella I hope you dont mind me piggybacking off your corrupted steven series i just find it fascinating and i love writing the recovery process!!
> 
> Title is from ‘Anytime’ by Snail Mail. I compiled a playlist of songs I listened to while writing and editing this fic that can be listened to [on spotify.](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0grhRReXX276HsK6FSlmcu?si=i_OcGdCbReid5Szg_l-dtQ)

**_8:42_ **

Steven wakes up and he’s lying in the bathtub. He looks over and sees his father, hunched over, forehead against the lip of the tub while his shoulders rise and fall - deep breath in, and hold, and a loud snore-exhale-whump - with the motions of sleep. Not everything makes sense to begin with. There’s some new scratches on the bathroom ceiling, for instance, deep incisions like a bear’s claws. The shower curtain is on the floor. There’s some blood on the bathmat, but only specks - and by the mop leaning up against the door, he guesses that Pearl was frantically scrubbing at the floor all night, to keep it tidy for him the next day.

It’s a small gesture, but significant. He can smell bleach.

As he stirs, mouth opening slightly with a yawn, he scrunches his face in concentration. Something about his body feels distinctly off. He’s sore and stiff, bones aching. Sure, sleeping in the bathtub will never be comfortable, but there’s definitely some lingering pains from over-exerting himself. For whatever reason, it takes until the grinding crackle of his jaw opening to connect the sights and the pains with the situation at hand.

_He’s back again._

He sits up abruptly, hands rushing up to touch his face. His mouth - no, his jaw - has _changed again._ It’s not the _same_ anymore, and that’s terrifying. His hands, when he recoils from the feeling of his newly arranged face like he’s been burned, have mottled patches of pink all over, like scabs, more pronounced than they were the day before. And as the water settles, he dares to glance down at his reflection.

What he sees isn’t quite human, but hasn’t that always been the case? It’s decidedly less human than he would’ve liked, though.

Everything goes… kind of numb, after that. He stares as the ever-moving water shifts his features, making him look more distorted, more normal, more distorted again, before settling on somewhere in between all of that. There are tiny horns, though he can only see them from his hair being somewhat flattened to his head by a combination of sweat from the trials of the night and the bathwater he’s been lying in for the last few hours, shimmering with magic.

The showerhead drips, sending his reflection into more indecipherable ripples. A memory comes back - Amethyst hitting him with a jet of freezing water from the showerhead, him crashing back against the tiles, slipping into the tub with scrabbling fingernails (no, claws?), raking the ceiling, tearing down the shower curtain, until he’s fully submerged. Pearl is crying, his dad is crying - Garnet is shouting, and she never shouts - Amethyst reaches up with one hand to the medicine cabinet, still blasting Steven with icy water to keep him at bay, knocks a vial off - Pearl skids across the floor to catch it, cries harder as a splash of blue essence makes contact with her skin, her knees buckling as she’s physically overcome with the intense grief Blue Diamond’s ichor contains. She and Garnet grab the vials, pour them in, and his mind fades to pure, unfiltered white noise.

The confusing flurry of memories only amplify that initial wave of panic.

As Steven tries to stand up in the tub, he slips and reaches out to steady himself, but the thump launches Greg into consciousness once more, a stream of quiet cursing after he slams his head against the tub in his sudden shift of mind. He stops as he lays eyes on Steven, mouth a perfect ‘O’ that opens and closes a few times before he can speak.

“St-Steven! Steven, kiddo, are you - I mean, how are you feeling?! You were - you know, you were…”

Steven gets the gist, but when he goes to speak it’s a strangled sound. He remembers he doesn’t understand how words work, at least not in practice. Vowels and consonants go together in sequences, they stitch together to create words, to convey meaning; he knows that much. He knows he wants to tell his father that it hurts but not to worry, it’ll all get better soon… but even if he could, it would be a lie that wouldn’t fool Greg for a second, and wouldn’t it be cruel of him to lie to his dad’s face like that after everything that has transpired?

“I, stop and start - changing - crunches, it - the brain, my brain,” he starts to say, mind scrambling as the words he’s looking for - _it hurts, it’s scary, make it go away_ \- dry up in the back of his throat.

Steven watches his father’s face crumple, grief-stricken, and he cautiously reaches over to cup Steven’s face with a trembling hand.

“My boy,” he whispers.

  
  


**_9:01_ **

The coffee keeps on smoking - no, steaming. It wafts. Steven watches wisps of hot air dance from the surface of the dark liquid, springing to life and slithering into nothingness. From just beyond the steam, Pearl and Amethyst look concerned. They’ve made him breakfast (eggs and toast, untouched on the coffee table), they’ve made him coffee (also untouched), they’ve sat him on the couch with plenty of pillows and bundled him in a blanket and heck, Pearl even broke out MC Bear-Bear from too-old-for-toys jail and wedged him in between Steven’s shoulder and a pair of plush green cushions. She keeps mumbling about making him feel safe and secure, as though they’re swaddling an infant. Amethyst has so far offered to turn on the television set or light the fireplace or even set up a game of Kitchen Kalamity to take his mind off of things, but right now he can hardly focus on anything else.

His mind is on exactly two things; how the hell he got so screwed up last night, and how truly captivating the steam from his coffee is. It feels like something from another lifetime.

Greg is holding his hand, squeezing it periodically as Garnet relays information to him as matter-of-factly as she can in a situation so unprecedented. In the other, he holds his piping hot coffee, but the notion of holding anything feels _wrong_. He should be clawing the walls, digging his fingers into the dirt and pulling up chunks of the earth.

“You weren’t fully gone, Steven,” Garnet begins, keeping her voice neutral. Steven knows her so well, though, he knows every falter, every tremor that she hides whenever she tries to steel herself. He can’t tell what _he_ is, but he knows his family.

“So what happened to him?” Greg asks, far less composed. His face hasn’t relaxed since Steven woke him, his brow furrowed, face pinched with worry. “Garnet, we already healed him! He should be okay, shouldn’t he? All the other gems you guys healed have been fine! They never - they never went back like this!!”

Pearl’s hands clasp together tightly, eyes wide in terror, and Amethyst awkwardly reaches across to rest a hand atop hers.

"Steven isn't like other gems."

"Because he's half human?"

"That's not the problem,” Garnet says simply. “It's because he's part diamond."

Ah, right. He's part diamond. His teeth grind absently as he dwells on this.

Greg falters. "Wh- So it's… Garnet, I don't understand that. I don't understand that logic! The Diamonds _caused_ this problem, shouldn't Steven be more resistant to corruption?!"

"In theory. But Steven is one of the keys to treating corruption. If that key is lost, or faulty… it becomes ineffective."

Lost. Faulty. Ineffective. Those are words that Steven could get used to.

Pearl straightens up in her seat and bursts out, "But! We don't know everything yet."

"We don't know _anything_ yet," mutters Amethyst.

“Steven is a diamond. When any other gem is corrupted, they rely on Steven’s ability to heal, along with that of the other three diamonds, to revert the gem to their former state. But if Steven, a diamond, is corrupted, he can’t simply heal himself. The treatment on its own has been nullified.” Garnet pauses. “At least, that’s the explanation that holds most ground.”

“It’s certainly plausible that Steven can’t simply heal himself,” Pearl adds, fingers knotting together, loosening, clasping again as she talks. “But we can’t give up hope that this will all come to pass as he grows stronger! It’s only been three weeks since we first healed him, it’s a little soon to say _anything_ with certainty!”

Hearing the gems discuss this so openly in front of him feels… intrusive, somehow. He’s there, but he’s not, as though he’s listening with his ear pressed to a glass against the door. They’re talking with voices just above his head, just out of reach, close enough that he hears everything but can’t quite process it. So he keeps watching the steam from the coffee go up, up.

“We managed to bring him back from this once,” Garnet points out. “So we can do it again. It’s likely that the longer he stays in this conscious state, the confusion and delirium from corruption will fade.”

“So he’ll go back to normal?” Greg asks, eyeing his son fretfully.

“His powers are tied to his emotions,” Garnet explains, removing her visor. “It’s likely that once his mind calms down the corruption will be neutralised by his healing powers, even if it isn’t enough to fully cure him.”

She looks Greg in the eye, trying to convey a sense of certainty, but none of them know what’s going to happen now, so why pretend to have control over something as untameable as this? Steven can only speculate it’s to maintain _order_ and _balance_ at such a chaotic time, but it falls flat to him. Greg seems to take it as a good sign though, and swallows thickly, blinking back more tears.

“Then that’s what we’ll have to do. We’ll just take it one step at a time, right, Schtu-ball?”

He nods stiffly, but his mind is already skipping ahead. He glances over at the warp pad. It’s the morning, that means daytime, that means teaching, helping the residents of Little Homeworld progress in their Earth studies...

Steven wriggles in his seat uncomfortably, his jaw grinding again like a rusty gear as he tries to respond.

“Day usual, yes. Get back for warp pad. Yeah? Homeworld - Little Homeworld - starting to class soon, time to go-”

Amethyst and Pearl both look stricken by his garbled speech, squeezing each other a little tighter, and Garnet’s brow furrows.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea. Not today.”

He grips his mug a little tighter, shaking his head and wrenching his hand from Greg’s, gesturing pointedly at the warp pad.

“No, it teaches, exercise! Theory! Missing to the gems, can’t I?”

“Steven, you’ve had a… really rough night,” Greg protests. “Please, son. I’m not sure you could teach in this state, it’s all really affected you.”

No, they’re wrong! He needs normalcy. Routine. Why don’t they understand that? Why can’t they comprehend that familiarity is what he needs right now, to get all the pieces back that he needs to be _Steven clodding Universe_ again?!

The mug cracks in his hand, and hot coffee seeps out like a dam breaking. He doesn’t register the pain at first but almost instantly Garnet’s hand shoots out, snatching the mug from him and moving it to one side. Her other hand, a sapphire resting in its palm, reaches for Steven’s and a soothing coolness ebbs through to his, relieving the spike of pain from the scalding liquid.

“It shouldn’t blister, fortunately for you,” she says, but the corners of her mouth pull down in a frown. “But in this state, you’re still disoriented. You shouldn’t risk exerting yourself until you’re feeling stable again, and I can only see bad things coming from you visiting Little Homeworld today.”

“Can’t - won’t stop, gems - rocks - teach guiding hand to productive and lifestyle positive,” Steven tries to reason, more frustrated than ever. He knows the words are coming out wrong. He knows that these words he’s stringing together are jumbled up like a load of laundry in his mouth. But surely Garnet can see how this is going to ruin him for good, being kept from the things that make him him?

“Steven, please.” Her eyes are searching over him for some sign that he’s willing to listen. He holds her gaze, still fighting the urge to leap up, scramble on all fours to the warp pad and get away from here, go anywhere.

She sighs. “This isn’t a permanent solution. We don’t even know how fast you’ll come back from it this time.” Garnet squeezes his hands tighter. “It could be hours. You could be feeling better by the end of the day.”

“...Or?”

“Or… it could take longer than that. But forcing yourself to carry on as normal isn’t going to help you heal any faster, Steven.”

_Damn it. Damn it! Damn it!!_

He hangs his head, and slowly nods.

  
  


**_11:20_ **

Video games don’t really help these days.

Sure, escapism is nice, but it’s not a necessity like teaching gems how to adapt to this ever-changing world is. And after how long its been since he last settled down to replay Golf Quest or the latest Lonely Blade DLC, he finds it doesn’t give him joy anymore. Instead, his mind is weighed down with this restless feeling, this urge to be doing anything but relaxing and allowing his healing powers to take over. Greg is borrowing Steven’s bed to catch up on some much-needed sleep, Pearl is reorganising the Little Homeschool schedule in the kitchen and Garnet has sat herself down on the warp pad, arms folded. Clearly, he’s not going anywhere.

Amethyst is Player One right now. She’s determined to complete some mission on Lonely Blade's latest console release, her hair tied back to keep it from her face, her lip slightly chewed on as she concentrates. Steven once read somewhere that it’s easier to have a difficult conversation in a car, because you’re both facing the same direction and that somehow unites you. He’s wondering if that roundabout logic is what inspired Amethyst demand that he help her locate the head of Lonely Blade’s fallen master, a level she’s been putting off for months on account of the gore being unrealistic and badly rendered.

"Thanks for doing this with me, Steven," she says through gritted teeth, thumb rapidly slamming against the A button as if that will make the unskippable opening cutscene go by faster.

"Yeah." Single sentences don't seem to get jumbled, so he's trying to stick to them. His head is clearer than when he first woke up, but his words still sound rough. Just when he'd gotten used to the change in his jaw left over from the initial corruption, he's regressed again. Typical, just fucking typical.

"You're really helping me out here, bud," she continues, eyes still trained on the screen.

Is he? Steven glances down at the controller in his hands. It feels awkward, like it's not supposed to be there. Or maybe it's his _hands_ that aren't supposed to be here. Last night there were paws - claws - and no way to hold anything, so the controller is almost painfully unnatural to hold. Every time it buzzes he almost loses a hold of it.

“Trying can’t buttons but… pressing d-pad,” he tries. The game has entered split-screen mode because Steven is lagging behind the first checkpoint. His character runs into a wall, and he grits his teeth.

“It’s okay, dude! This is fun, okay? It’s fun.” She says this a few times, glancing between him and the screen as if looking for some sign of… what, reassurance? He expected that she at least had a plan when she’d suggested they play video games all morning, but apparently not.

“All right, I’ve worked out a new schedule for today!” Pearl calls, already heading towards the warp pad with a thick binder tucked under her arm. “It’ll be a more… relaxed day. A day to test out their decision-making skills, to, er, build their autonomy! Once your condition has improved, we can introduce the old schedule again. All right? Great! I’ll be right back, Steven, okay?”

He nods mutely and she gives him a reassuring wave, before disappearing from view, warping out moments later.

He didn’t miss the way her expression crumbled in the moments before leaving his sight.

“She’ll be fine. Just needs time to get used to it again.” Amethyst has paused the game, and turns to him with a serious expression. “You’re worried about her, right? But, look… it’s just a lot to deal with. I mean, you get that. Obviously. She feels responsible for it all, even though it was just a - a bad accident. She just wants you to be okay, we all do.”

“I know.”

And Steven _does_ know. It’s clear that they care, it’s just… it all feels fake. He might as well be stuck in the video game, banging against the glass of the television screen to be let out. He’s a spectacle standing by and watching them react to him like he’s a damn jump scare, and he can’t stand it.

“You two were arguing when you… y’know.” Amethyst sighs. “That’s why she’s so jumpy. I don’t know how much of it you remember. You found out something about Rose, another shitty thing she did thousands of years ago. Pearl wasn’t happy about it either, but you were furious. And, I don’t know, something snapped. We managed to trap you in the bathroom before you could leave the house, though. Thank god.”

“I don’t… know the memory. Remember. I don’t.”

It’s pretty hazy. There are flashes - _“I know you’re upset, Steven, but for all the mistakes she made-”_ and _“Stop calling them mistakes, Pearl, stop defending her!”_ and the switch being flipped, the lights going off in his head, four notes of a song _breaking._

“Look, Steven, I… I’m so glad you’re okay, holy shit.” Amethyst reaches over and pulls him into a hug, squeezing him tighter and tighter. “It was horrible enough losing you for the first time, being there when it happened again - it was bad. It was real bad, Steven. I _never_ want to lose you like that again.”

He hugs her back, burying his face into her shoulder, her mane of silver hair tickling his face.

“Yeah. Me neither.”

  
  


**_12:45_ **

The diamonds have heard about the situation. How, Steven can’t figure out. The gems wouldn’t tell, it must have spread through the Little Homeworld grapevine from Pearl’s schedule announcement and ended up flitting on over to full-sized Homeworld.

They ring and they ring, but he doesn’t take their calls.

  
  


**_14:04_ **

_Nothing is working, nothing is fucking working!!_

Steven is pissed. He’s watched Amethyst playing Lonely Blade for almost 2 hours now, he’s eaten sandwiches, he’s even tried listening to a calming mental health podcast to relax his mind and allow the healing to take over.

So far, nothing. And he’s fucking pissed.

He rises from the blankets and pillows, kicking them away in frustration after almost tripping up on stray blankets tangled around his legs. Amethyst looks up from the screen.

“Going somewhere, Steven?”

“Want to… just - angry! It’s not - not going through! Healing! Words - _fuck!”_

Amethyst gapes a little.

“Hold the phone, dude, I’ve never heard you drop an f-bomb before. I know you’re mad, but geez. Here, c’mon, talk to me. Let’s hash this thing out.”

“Need to - angry! Express it! Kick it!”

“Aight, I get it, you gotta blow off some steam. You honestly think it’ll help? Garnet said you should take it easy,” Amethyst points out.

“Calming, failed! Not going through!”

She looks doubtful, but he’s walking in circles, the anger has nowhere to go, he starts scratching at the pink on his arms, just trying to make it all fucking go away-

“Fine. Okay, umm, shit. I, I guess there’s nothing wrong with, uhh, getting your frustrations out in a healthy, safe way.” She folds her arms, internally debating with herself, before hopping to her feet too. “Stay here. Don’t even think about going, Garnet’s still lurking around here somewhere. Imma sort something out.”

Well, as a caged zoo animal in his own fucking home, what else can he do but wait?

  
  


**_14:38_ **

‘Sorting something out’ turns out to be Amethyst’s turn of phrase for sorting out a one-on-one training session with Pearl, back at the sky spire. They don’t tend to use it much these days when training the gems in Little Homeschool, but it’s a place familiar to them both, and private too. Pearl seems eager to avoid prying eyes on him today, but as long as he has some outlet for this restless energy, he doesn’t care at this point.

She seems hesitant to fight him, but his frustrations must be obvious if she’s willing to give it a try.

“This isn’t a fight,” she prefaces. “This is just a healthy sparring match. You’re going to work out that inner aggression. In fact, we’ll turn it into something positive. Humans produce higher levels of endorphins when exercising, so this might be just the thing you need to activate your healing powers and improve your current condition!”

Fine, if that’s how she wants to justify taking him on. All he really wants to do is hurl his feelings at something, anything, and if Pearl can’t keep up he’ll just take it out on what's left of this place.

He tries to summon his shield, but his gem seemingly can’t cope with trying to counterbalance corruption _and_ give him access to manifest his gem weapon, so he goes in with fists instead. Pearl, clearly not expecting a direct start to their sparring, hastily throws her sword to one side and blocks his punch, sending him back a little.

“Remember, keep a positive mindset,” she reminds him with a timid smile, but something about that just makes him angrier. He tries for his shield again, or even his bubble, and comes up short.

“It’s ruined,” he spits out, “All ruined! Everything - broken! Positive?! How?”

Pearl’s smile wavers.

“How…? Steven, it’s going to take time. You can’t expect it to go exactly how you want right away. It’s a healing process, there’s going to be rough patches, but we have to keep our spirits up, don’t we?”

Of course he fucking knows that!! But knowing it and being able to do it are two completely different concepts, and it feels ridiculous to even pretend that he’s in the right mindset to keep a positive attitude right now.

“Pearl… the fight. Last night, fight. We - why did it fight?”

He throws another punch, which she catches effortlessly. Her expression is pained.

“Oh, Steven, that - don’t worry about that little disagreement, it-”

“Tell me!”

“...It was about your mother. We were talking about… how she treated Volleyball, you’re still upset about it.”

Of course he is, she cracked the walls, she cried and broke her pearl with her shouts, and were they any different to his? He’d lost control too, in the Reef. He keeps fucking losing control.

“Just like her. I’m - anger, like she was, her rage - mine now, my rage… I lost to it!”

Another punch, weak. There’s nothing left in him, no pink energy threatening to take over no matter how upset he is. It’s all been drained away, the moment he let his mind fall from his grasp. It’ll recharge under the guise of his ‘recovery’, it’ll wait in the shadows, stalking him while he thinks he’s getting better at coping with this stuff, and then something will _happen,_ just like it always does, and he’ll simply - fade away again. Become the monster.

“Yes,” Pearl agrees sadly. “You regressed because you were so overwhelmed with the hatred you felt. And, and I understand _why,_ Steven, but you’re not her. But being an empath, channelling your emotions will do you so much good. So focus your mind. Focus on me.”

Oh, he’s trying. But he keeps noticing these pink hands of his. He keeps thinking about his horns, his scrambled mind. He keeps catching sight of different tiles, different pillars, and thinking back to all the times he’s fought Pearl in this spire, how many times he and Connie - and Stevonnie -

God, Stevonnie. No more Stevonnie.

He throws another punch but it’s weak and clumsy and Pearl catches it with ease. She’s about to launch into another constructive comment on his form, when she stops. She reaches over and cups Steven’s jaw, tilting his face up.

“Steven,” she murmurs softly, standing down. Her eyes soften with sadness, brow creasing in pain. “You’re crying. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have… I shouldn’t have said all of that, but I want to _help_ you with this.”

He reaches a shaky paw - no, it’s a _hand_ now, it’s a fucking hand, _you’re okay now_ \- to touch his eyes. Sure enough, tears.

He feels alone. He feels utterly, completely alone. Because of course it’s not just Stevonnie, he’s losing Smokey and Rainbow and Sunstone too, but standing here against cracked marble pillars and scuffed tiles, floating above the Swiss countryside, it’s Stevonnie’s absence he feels the most. Something that used to connect him to humanity, to Connie, is gone now. Who knows if it’ll ever be safe to fuse again?

Nothing is permanent. Nothing is certain.

“By - I’m by myself,” he chokes. “All alone, human, no more fusion.”

Pearl shakes her head. “Steven, you’re not alone,” she says firmly, reaching down to squeeze his shoulder. He shrinks away.

“I am, I can’t - Stevonnie will never happen! Not now! No Rainbow, or Sunstone. No Smokey. All alone, I can’t be alone!”

“You have us!” Pearl looks him in the eyes, fiercely as she would an opponent in battle. “They’ll be missed, of course, but you won’t lose what makes them. You won’t lose us, you won’t lose Connie. We’re all going to stand by you and work through this together! So please, dry your eyes. Focus your mind. And fight.”

He wipes his eyes, and he goes in with his fists swinging.

  
  


**_15:03_ **

In the end, Pearl wins. Steven lies winded, staring up at a dazzling blue sky, all of the frustration drained from his body. His hands are throbbing a little, his knuckles might be a little bruised tomorrow. After long being desensitised to the immense power he usually wields as a diamond, it’s strangely good to feel these kind of pains. It makes him feel more human.

There’s light footsteps, and a shadow casts over him. Pearl kneels down, offers him a juice box and says gently, “Things have to get worse before they get better.”

He’s starting to think there’s some truth to that sentiment.

  
  


**_15:42_ **

The diamonds send Spinel over, since no one has reported back on Steven’s condition since they last tried to contact him. Steven decides maybe it’s best not to see her today. The last thing he needs is to be reminded of yet another colossal fuck up on his mother’s part. It might undo every piece of progress he’s made since waking up in the bathtub this morning.

He hides in the shower like a coward, but letting the water run over him does make him feel a little better. Hopefully Spinel brought more ichor around, they’re all out after bringing him back from his latest relapse.

When the water stops and he’s towelling himself dry, he realises the lingering smell of bleach and blood is still there and feels an instant sense of guilt wash over him. It’s overpowering, but he pushes it back - _you know now that it can happen again, you need to get a grip!!_ But it’s not corruption, it’s just more fucking tears, so he lets them out. Luckily, the mirror is all fogged up from the shower, so he can’t see how truly messed up he looks right now. He scrubs his face extra hard and carries out his usual skincare routine, hoping when he leaves the bathroom his eyes won’t be too puffy.

Garnet’s sat on the couch when he leaves the bathroom.

“You missed Spinel,” she says. He nods, flopping down beside her with his arms folded. “She was worried about you. So are the diamonds.”

_“Right.”_

“I said the same thing.” There’s a soft smile on her face at his venomous sarcasm. She reaches over and wraps an arm around him, and he leans into it. “They want to schedule a meeting with you as soon as you’ve recovered. I told Spinel that wasn’t happening.”

“I need time,” he agrees, thankful Garnet’s been able to sense his apprehension. “Can’t do it, not yet.”

“You don’t have to do anything until you’re ready. This isn’t an easy time for you.”

“They don’t fix it. Can’t. It’ll just… sad them.”

They’ll get upset and blame themselves for being unable to heal him and Steven will have to sit there flatly comforting _them_ and wonder when this situation became about the diamonds. It’s what happened last time, after all, and he doesn’t have the energy. Not today, maybe not ever.

“It’s not about them,” Garnet says plainly. There’s a note of frustration there - even at a time like this, the situation has to revolve around the diamonds and their opinions on the matter - that Steven wholeheartedly agrees with.

He moves in closer, leaning his head against her chest and wrapping his arms around her waist. She pulls him in. After a few moments of stretched out silence, she murmurs, “Steven, can we stay like this? Just for a little while?”

He shuts his eyes and nods.

  
  


**_17:19_ **

The hug evolved into a nap, and now he’s extra groggy as he untangles from Garnet’s arms and heads up to his bedroom. His muscles are a little stiff already from the sparring with Pearl, and now he’s ready to collapse onto his bed and let sleep or death take him, whichever gets there first. But then he sees his phone and feels a pang of intense loneliness take hold. He knows what he has to do.

After getting comfortable under the covers, he calls up Connie and explains as best he can. His sentences are coming together easier now, with only the odd misplaced word or grammatical error, and the relief he feels when she understands completely is like a tidal wave washing over. He cries some more (it feels like he still has an eternity of tears left, regardless of how many he’s shed today alone) while she listens patiently on the other end. He can hear a page flip occasionally on the other side, and when he realises she’s normally studying by this time, he starts to apologise.

“Don’t,” she interrupts, and he can hear the way she cradles her phone closer. He closes his eyes and wishes it was him pressed up against her cheeks, with her arms fully wound around him and enveloping him with the kind of best friend hug he could really fucking do with right about now.

“But, I’m bothering it all, I’m cutting into your study time,” Steven starts, desperately.

“It’s not homework. I’m reading up on ASL.” She sighs softly. “I’m coming by after school tomorrow and we’re getting started on learning the basics of sign language. I mean, I know it hurt you to talk at first, last time this happened. We’re going to be better prepared for if this happens again, okay? And that starts with establishing non-verbal communication.”

He really wishes he could kiss her right now.

“Yeah.”

“I never want to be in a position where we can’t understand each other, Steven.”

He grips his phone tighter. “Me neither.”

She pauses for a few moments, and he listens out for her soft breathing. “We’re going to fight this, Steven. We’ll pull out all the stops.”

He manages a small smile, and hopes she can hear it in his voice. “Is that a Jam Bud promise?”

She laughs.

  
  


**_19:36_ **

It’s quiet tonight.

The wind is barely rattling the windows, a rarity when living so close to the ocean. The world has calmed down, and Steven finds himself all the more at ease from it. His thoughts and memories aren’t mixed up anymore. His words are back fully. It’s almost like his relapse into corruption never even happened, and it feels like a fever dream of sorts. But the tiredness in his bones and the tentative way his family are treating him tell a different, less fortunate tale.

Right now, everyone’s together. Greg is heating up some canned chilli and rice on the stove, Pearl’s making tea, and Amethyst and Garnet have sandwiched him in on the couch, swaddled entirely in blankets. While this morning everything felt like an overbearing nightmare, his thoughts are more grounded now, and the familiar sight of the beach house and his family quietly going about their evening routines is so comforting he could cry all over again.

The television is on so quietly he can barely make out what the overly-excited news anchor is saying, but whatever it is can wait. Everything in his life can wait, just for tonight.

“How are you feeling now?” Garnet asks him quietly.

“More like myself. It’s like I was a different person this morning, barely felt human at all.” He rests his head against her arm, squishing up against her shoulder pad. “I don’t want to go back to that again.”

The room falls silent, the low conversation between Pearl and Greg running dry as they turn to look at him.

“...We don’t want that for you either, buddy,” Amethyst says at last. “But I hate to tell ya, there’s no guarantee it won’t happen a third time.”

“Amethyst,” begins Pearl in quiet warning.

“But she has a point, Pearl.” Garnet pauses. “Steven, we can’t promise this is an isolated incident. It’s impossible to know what the future holds, even for me.”

The answer hurts, but he’d be lying if he hadn’t already figured out as such.

“I… I know it’s a part of me now and I can’t change it. But I want to keep it away for as long as I can. And if it does happen, I need a better strategy for bouncing back. Today has been the worst kind of torture for me, guys.”

“You’ve been so strong,” Pearl says, flashing him a nervous smile in an attempt at encouragement. “I have every faith that in time you’ll have some semblance of control over the healing time should this happen again, Steven.”

“Thanks, Pearl.” His heart swells a little. “You’ll help me move forward with this thing since it’s here to stay, right?”

“Uh, dude? How can you even ask that?” Amethyst scoffs. “We’re family. We do everything together, we’re the Crystal Freakin’ Gems!”

Garnet smirks at that, and even Pearl titters nervously.

Steven laughs. It’s small, it’s muted, but it’s a start.

“Hey, Schtu-ball, you ready to eat in a minute?” Greg calls.

“Sure, I’ll just wash up first.”

Steven untangles himself from this blanket cocoon he’s gotten tied up in, and heads to the bathroom. As the door shuts with a click he leans back against it, exhaling and inhaling slowly.

Here comes a thought.

He catches sight of himself in the bathroom mirror as he turns the faucet. Tiny horns, blotches of pink, the new jawline thanks to his now prominent underbite. There are bags under his eyes that he didn’t notice this morning. He looks more tired than he feels in this moment, but maybe it’s because he’s gotten tired of _feeling_ tired and now his brain is sending mixed messages across his nervous system affecting his perception of how tired he really is? The mind is a complex beast, that’s for sure.

He finds he doesn’t _hate_ what he sees, the longer he looks. Sure, his feelings are too complicated for him to say he likes this new look. But he’s here. He’s alive, his mind is almost intact. It could be so much worse than what it is.

For now, he’s going to focus on being present in his mind as he stands here watching his reflection stare wearily back at him. The absence is something he knows he can’t go back to, and sure, he still _feels_ lonely and isolated in this moment, but the rational part of his brain is fully alert by now. He has a support system. He’s loved. He’s going to make it out of this alive and fighting because he’s Steven Fucking Universe and that’s what he _does,_ corruption be damned!

He tries for a tiny smile in the mirror, and his mirror self smiles back.

_Hey, if every pork chop were perfect, right?_

**Author's Note:**

> So I wrote this for the Cluster’s secret santa fic exchange! This was actually my second attempt at this fic and I wrote it in about 3-4 days and submitted it maybe an hour before the deadline because writers block and christmas temp jobs am i right?? It was a mad fever dream of a writing process and I definitely made some spelling and grammar mistakes at some point, and a few things felt vague, so I tried to fix it up before uploading here. But because this fic is over 6k words I just… I get so tired reading it and looking for errors and things to tie up. It’s here now because I can’t look at it anymore, I need something new. But it was so much fun to write and I hope you enjoyed it!!


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